Goodnight Kiss
by Sierra Sitruc
Summary: First I wanted to crush her up into little pieces. Angstfluff  or as I call it - flangst No plot, just flangst and cliché bits. HermioneRon


**Disclaimer:** I don't own the characters, if I did...Mwahahaha.

**Author's Note: **_coughs._ A few people weren't very happy with the ending of **'_Ron and Hermione's Big Date_'** so, I decided a _sequel_ should be in order, but I didn't really have any ideas, but then...I got one! So YES this is a sequel, but it is also a stand alone.

**Summary:** First I wanted to crush her up into little pieces. Angst/fluff (or as I call it - flangst) No plot, just flangst and cliché bits. Hermione/Ron

---

**Goodnight Kiss **

_by _

_Sierra Sitruc_

I never thought I was very good with words, occasionally I'd say something worthwhile, but normally it was just luck. It was the last night of my sixth year when I learned that this was very, very true. I wasn't very good with words _at all_.

The firelight filled the room with a warm orangey glow that filled me with false comfort and protection. Gave me the strength (or stupidity) to say things to Ron I wish I never, ever had.

I was such an _idiot_.

My mouth just ran away from me, saying whatever it felt like. The truth, mostly.

Ron and I were sitting across from one another, playing an odd game of chess. Odd, because I was playing it, Ron usually refused to play chess with me, but since it was our last night at school, I guess he decided to make an exception.

Harry had gone up to bed once Ginny had left, and the game was taking unusually long and my eyelids were starting to droop. So maybe I can blame tiredness for the things I said during our conversation.

"It's going to be a long summer without you guys." I said casually, "I will especially miss you." What the hell? How did that slip out?

Ron and I both stared at the chess pieces intently.

"Will you miss me?" I asked quietly, trying to be sneaky about it. But then instantly regretting it and wanting to tape my mouth shut permanently.

"Of course I will." He said immediately. My fingers twitched as I played with a chunk of my defeated rook.

"Why do I doubt that?" I said, not looking him in the eye.

"Hermione, why wouldn't I miss you? You're one of my best friends, I'm required to miss you." _Ouch_. Ron saw his mistake and instantly corrected it. "I mean - well, I can't control if I miss you or not, I just will."

A little better, Ron was trying not to hurt my feelings, but I suppose I was provoking this.

"Maybe I can come visit the Burrow with Harry again." I suggested, Ron nodded his head.

"I'm sure mum won't mind." But would _Ron_ mind?

"Would you mind?" I asked, watching his knight destroy my last pawn.

"No, no, it's always fun having Harry and you over, and Ginny likes it too. Everybody's happy." Ron muttered, he seemed cornered, almost defensive.

I folded my right leg underneath me and I was saying something stupid again, "You know, I like talking to you Ron." _Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. _

"Uh huh." Ron said, still waiting for me to make a move so he could decide what to do next. I thoughtlessly moved my bishop. Ron crushed it with his queen. I cringed, I hadn't seen that coming.

Was all Ron going to do was _play chess_? Wasn't chess just an excuse to talk to your friends? That's what he did with Harry, they would play chess and talk about quidditch, but with me it was only chess, chess, chess.

Ugh. This was turning out to be a horrible night. I felt humiliated and miserable and was ready to go up to bed to have another one of my midnight cry sessions over Ron.

I quickly let Ron murder me in chess, before standing up to clean up our game pieces. My Queen was highly offended, "You let that boy win, didn't you?"

Ron glared at the Queen, "Who cares, I still won didn't I?"

I tried not to smirk at Ron's anger at a...chess piece.

We stood in front of each other awkwardly. It was silent, because I think Ron and I had both realized that if we were a couple, this would be the part where we kissed goodnight.

I was appalled when Ron spread his arms lightly and said, "Hug?"

And against my will - _AGAINST MY WILL_ - I fell into his arms helplessly and he wrapped his arms around me and it was...lovely. Stupid Ron Weasley and his wonderful hugs.

It was his fault I opened my horribly active mouth and said, "You are the nicest boy ever, you know that? Well...Maybe some older guys are nicer, but of young guys, you are the nicest."

I said goodnight, screaming silently at myself all the way up. Why on EARTH had I allowed that to come out of my mouth?! I am the ultimate moron. I should not be allowed out in public without a shock collar.

---

The train ride the next day was needless to say, uncomfortable...For _me_. Ron, Harry and Ginny talked lively together and Neville and Luna came in together holding hands. Goodness but when I saw how happy Luna was with Neville, I regretted turning him down for the Yule Ball over two years ago. Maybe I wouldn't be so hung up on Ron if I had, but I suppose there had been Krum...

What's worse is that no one noticed I was in a mood but Ginny, who can always pick up on when I'm annoyed because we're enough alike that it isn't a very difficult task.

"Girls' moods always seem to go right over boys' heads." Ginny explained as we walked off the train. "I think it's more of protective denial than anything. They're scared of us." That made me smile.

We said our goodbyes before parting ways, I couldn't keep my eyes off Ron and I noticed that he took note of my...looking.

---

I was pouting in my room for the tenth time that summer when I decided to write Ron a letter, since it was quite obvious he had no plans to Owl me any time soon. I harrumphed while I pulled out paper.

I wrote gibberish, reminding him to do his summer homework and such, just to get it out of my system. I couldn't send it of course until _he_ sent me a letter, because I didn't have an owl of my own.

Ginny actually wrote me a letter first. I gave the owl both her and Ron's letters. When the next day, the owl returned with a letter, it was only Ginny's. Ron hadn't wrote me back.

Fierce anger swelled within me. That Ronald Weasley, not writing back - and here he knows I like him! Why is it he flatters me all he wants in private, but when it comes to owls, he can't be arsed to do anything.

Of course, he'd be inviting me to The Burrow or Grimmauld Place any day now. Just like last year...but then again, that had been before he'd known I'd liked him. I bit my lip worriedly. Maybe Ron wouldn't invite me after all. Maybe I wouldn't see Ron in the flesh until September 1st!

I don't think I could handle that.

It wasn't until a week before Harry's birthday that I got the invitation to the Burrow...from _Ginny_.

I was furious, unexpected because normally I'm very pleased to be invited over there, but I was unhinged. I locked the door to my room and stomped about with my arms crossed. "Stupid Ron Weasley!" I hissed to myself, flopping onto my bed miserably.

I gritted my teeth and kicked my feet about. "Idiot - we're both idiots. I don't know who's the bigger idiot, me for wanting him, or him for just being an idiot...And now...I'm talking to myself." I groaned into my pillow. "I'm such a moron, I hate it."

I did not write back for two days, just for my own brief satisfaction of keeping their owl. It was petty, but fun.

I was going to the Burrow on Harry's birthday, just an hour before he arrived so I could get settled - we were throwing him a birthday party.

I picked out what I was going to wear the day before, and I did my make up with extra care, not to mention my hair. I don't see the point in straightening it again, but I carefully pulled it back. Ron would hopefully take notice. But he probably wouldn't, I realized sadly. All of this was just a vain attempt to gain his attention.

---

After all the preparing and worry, arriving at the Burrow was...anti-climatic. Everyone, including Ron, hugged me hello and they took my things to Percy's old room, which was rather awkward in itself. I hadn't seen Percy in ages, but Ron said that he'd stopped by the Burrow while they were at school to talk to Mrs. Weasley.

Harry came finally, looking distressed as always, but melted into a hug with Ginny as soon as he got there and his face relaxed. I must admit, they are shaping up to be a very cute couple.

Ginny says they're taking things slow, not claiming a relationship, but just getting to know one another better and I like that idea. Slow.

Sometimes I feel like Ron and I are moving slowly..._perilously_ slow. Because we know each other backwards and forwards, but romantically...nothing's ever going to happen, it seems. But if we were like Ginny and Harry, we'd have been 'seeing' one another for six years.

I hugged Harry hello, "Good to see you." He smiled at me, sometimes I wonder what would've happened had I fallen for Harry. It was never meant to be of course, but would he have been as bad as Ron? _Not writing back to my letters..._

Harry moved on to Mrs. Weasley who nearly swallowed him up in her hug. She adored Harry, I knew, liked him better than she did me, but I think he deserves it. Like he deserves to be closer to Ron and to Ginny and...everyone. He's just so likable and I'm not. It's only fair.

That's a big problem, really. I'm jealous of Harry and Ron's friendship and I know that it makes me look like a bad friend, but I can't help it. I just want someone who is closest to me, who I know best and who knows me best. But there isn't anyone.

I force a smile as we go to have cake in the kitchen.

I didn't feel very fun at all. I laughed at all the jokes Fred and George made and I answered when spoken to, but if anybody ever paid attention to me, were closest to me, they would see the brooding display I was putting on.

Towards the end of the evening, with everyone getting ready for bed, the lights about the house flickering off, I found myself drinking a glass of water in the kitchen, alone. I sat at the table, staring at the half empty glass, wondering what was so wrong with me that no one liked me best.

"Ron got you down again, Hermione?" I heard Harry asked, he strolled into the kitchen looking pleasant. He grabbed a drink himself and sat across from me.

"Not so much Ron, but yes, Ron." I sighed, "I always do this. I take one upsetting thought and turn it into a thousand other sad thoughts until I'm thoroughly depressed."

"What was the one thought?"

I thought back over my muddled thoughts of the evening. "I think it was one of the Ron thoughts. Nothing's-ever-going to-happen-so-why-do-I-bother, thoughts." I specified. "I know you probably wouldn't tell me if he had, but has Ron said anything?"

Harry shook his head, "He's been very quiet about the whole thing. Ever since Parvati and Lavender told him."

"God, but I hate those girls' big mouths." I groaned, this was a frequent complaint I'd had over the past few months. "Everything was fine, normal, relaxed...And now it's awkward and it's all their fault. If they hadn't opened their big mouths -"

"Hermione, he would've found out eventually with or without those two getting into it." Harry said, slightly aggravated with me, no doubt.

I had a new thought, "Harry, who would you say knows me best?"

"What?" He asked, caught off guard.

"Who knows me better than anybody else in the world?" I asked.

Harry looked thoughtful, "Err...I don't know. Who?"

"That's the thing, I don't know." I felt suddenly like a plug had just been pulled and all my thoughts were about to spill out. "Everyone I'm close to is closer to someone else. Ginny. You. Ron. Ginny's closer to you and Ron than she is me, but we do talk about girly stuff a lot. You're closer to Ginny and Ron and Ron is closer to Ginny and you. I feel like I'm out of the loop. I always feel like that, if it's not for my know-it-all attitude then it's my hair."

Harry was silent after I'd spoken, and I wondered if maybe I hadn't offended him a bit. "I always thought we were equally close together." He said finally and I stared.

"You do?"

"Yeah, but in different ways...Ginny and I are close like a couple, Ginny and Ron are close like siblings, you and I are close like friends and you and Ron have you're own unique...Thing." He smirked as he said that. "I've never really taken the time to think over who knew who best, I think that's a girl thing."

I moaned, "It probably is. I've been such a stupid girl lately. I've been like another Lavender Brown on the loose."

"God! No!" Harry gasped out, chuckling. "You're too smart to be like that. At least you know when you're being stupid, she doesn't."

"I guess you're right." I finished my water, "G'night Harry. Thanks for the chat."

---

After talking to Harry I felt more of an equal around everyone, and I think it showed. I spoke up more when I had an idea or about what I was feeling. The week I spent at the Burrow was fulfilling even if Ron didn't show any interest in me more than usual.

I threw myself at my school books after our trip to Diagon Alley and I nearly forgot about Ronald Bilius Weasley's existence completely. Almost.

Until - The Dance.

I don't know what Dumbledore was thinking, really, our school was not the dancing type, we were the magical type, why did we need _another_ dance? The last one was failure enough to conclude that no more should ever be held - again.

I wanted to go though, but there was only one person I wanted to go _with_ and...he might say yes. I remembered fourth year when he and Harry had tried to get me to go as his date.

And don't they say if you want it done right, you go to do it yourself?

---

"Hey, Ron." I said as we walked to Transfiguration.

"Yeah?"

"You want to go as my date to the dance?"

"Uh, sure..." I saw a thoughtful look cross his face, "Will you kiss me goodnight this time?" He asked looking perfectly innocent.

"_This_ time?" I was quite perplexed.

"Remember at the end of last year, you hugged me. You wouldn't kiss me." Ron looked highly offended. I realized what hug he was talking about.

I smiled up at him. "Alright, this time I'll kiss you goodnight."

----

**End Note**:_ Holy hell and all it's devils! I just learned that Hermione has a younger sister...my entire world is flipped! No, I did not put her in the story, but I just found out via Harry Potter Lexicon that JK Rowling had talked about a younger sister, though she thought it was too late to introduce her now into the books. WHOA. I'm so...Shocked! It's kind of like a Lily and Petunia thing, you know? One a witch, the other not. This just opens up all kinds of possibilities for Harry/Hermione shippers, which, I must admit, pisses me off royally. I'm a die hard Ginny/Harry and Hermione/Ron shipper, obviously._

Anyway, I hope this story makes those of you who were annoyed that I hadn't made the first part a happy ending.


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